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You have probably been always hearing that exercise is good for you, well, many people exercise because they want to lose weight, but there are other very good reasons why you should exercise….Here are some of them..

Exercising improves cognitive function; research has shown that exercising can boost your memory, this is because the hippocampus, a part of the brain imperative for memory and learning is highly active during exercise. And also, since exercising increases blood flow throughout the body, the brain gets more energy and oxygen when you exercise. Research also shows that exercise can actually reverse hippocampal shrinkage, which occurs naturally with age, and hence boost memory in older adults. Another study found that students who exercise perform better on tests than their less athletic peers.

Exercising reduces the risk of heart disease; Research shows that people who don’t exercise have two times the risk of heart disease than individuals who exercise regularly. Another found that people who exercise on a regular basis have a 20% less likely to suffer a fatal heart attack. Exercise has been found to increase the ability of blood to clear away clots in the blood vessels.

Exercising improves posture; It is imperative to have a good posture. Having a bad posture can result in undesirable implications like cutting off your circulation and stress. And one of the best ways to fix your posture is to exercise.

Builds aerobic capacity: Many of the other benefits of exercise stem from this basic fact, so if you remember nothing else from this list, building aerobic power is your most important reason to exercise. Your aerobic capacity is your body’s ability to work at maximum capacity by getting oxygen from the air to your body’s tissues. Ordinarily, you lose about 1 percent a year of your aerobic power, that is, 10 percent per decade. Both short and long-term exercise training can cut this loss in half according to studies.

Exercising improves posture: Good posture is important, and one of the best ways to fix your posture is to exercise the muscles holding you back. Regularly exercising your abs, back, and other muscles can go a long way into fixing your posture, both sitting and standing.

Improves sex life; Well, this is an interesting one! With more muscle mass comes greater stimulation to produce androgen which help both men and women maintain their sexual functioning. You are also likely to feel more fit and be more fit, which will benefit your interest in and ability to carry out sexual activity. You will also have greater emotional resilience, and this benefits your relationship health.

Lowers risk of Type 2 diabetes; By exercising regularly, you improve your body’s ability to metabolize glucose, hence head off this disease.

You will sleep better; Exercising during the day benefits your sleep at night. The physical exertion you engage in during the day helps your body’s circadian rhythm keep in tune. Sleeping better at night also improves your immune functioning and even lowers your risk for heart disease, diabetes, and cognitive impairment.

Increases your metabolism: Your metabolic rate (BMR) is the amount of energy your body while you’re awake and in a state of complete rest. The BMR is affected by several things; gender, body composition and activity level. Regularly exercising will help prevent a decline in both your lean body mass and your BMR.

Relieves depression: Researchers have found that mild to moderately depressed individuals who engage in aerobic exercise for 15-30 minutes at least every other day typically experience a positive mood swing within two to three weeks. Many psychologists have noted and concluded that, “exercise is nature’s best tranquilizers.”

Can slow the aging process; Exercise can slow down the inevitable age-related decline in physiological systems that individuals experience as they get older. For example, instead of losing aerobic fitness as you age, mostly at the rate of 10 percent per year, exercise can increase your aerobic capacity even as you age. Strength training exercises can reverse the loss of muscular fitness that older people mostly experience

Keeps bones strong; As you advance in age, you tend to lose bone mineral strength. And again, this happens at about 1 percent per year . Exercise is the key to maintaining your bone’s health. Specifically, the required exercise for bone strength is resistance training, which involves weights.

Reduces the risk of arthritis: Arthritis is one of the most commonly experienced chronic disease in the middle-aged. Arthritis is as a result of outgrowth in of bones in joints and abnormalities in the cartilage. Engaging in stretching and flexibility training through yoga, or other ways to increase the range of movement of your joints helps to reduce the risk of arthritis and helps protect your joints from damage caused by overuse.

It helps your fertility: Harvard researchers found that men who exercised had a higher concentration of sperm in their semen and that the quality of the sperms were higher than average. Exercising also boosts fertility in women. A meta-analysis looking at nearly 27,000 women found that those who worked out had lower rates overall of infertility, higher rates of implantation, and lower rates of miscarriage. One Caution: Women who exercised too strenuously or too much impaired their fertility, so it’s all about balance. Researchers advise exercising three times a week for an hour each time.

Reduces body fat: Your body mass index (BMI), provides an approximate measure of your overall metabolic status. If you’re in the overweight to obese categories now, a regular program of aerobic exercise can bring your BMI down to normal levels.speeding up your metabolism.

Physical exercise reduces PMS symptoms; You probably wouldn’t feel like doing it, but getting involved in a physical exercise will help with your crappy mood, aches, and pains, and even depression associated with Premenstrual syndrome.

Improves mood: People who exercise regularly also have lower risk of depression. Exercise is one of the behavioral treatments for psychological disorders. Aerobic exercise improves your mood by causing your body’s endorphins to kick in. Endorphins are the natural “feel good” neurotransmitters that start to exert their effects after about 20 minutes of training. These regular exercise-related boosts eventually improve your overall mental health over the long term.

Increases the ‘Good’ (HDL) cholesterol: Exercise is one of the few activities that is effective in raising your level of HDL. HDL is the type of cholesterol that lowers your risk of heart disease. As a matter of fact, research indicates that for every 1 percent increase in HDL you experience, you incur a 2 to 3 percent reduction in your risk for heart disease. At the same time, as exercise increases your level of HDL, it lowers the LDL (the ‘bad’ cholesterol).

Reduces blood pressure: Chronic high blood pressure (hypertension) is the number one form of heart disease. The causes of hypertension include the increased plaque in the arteries that builds up from consuming a high-fat diet. Exercise helps reduce your blood pressure, it does this partly by attacking the plaque in your arteries. As the arteries widen, the blood flows through more freely, and your blood pressure eventually starts to drop. Hypertension also decreases as the result of exercise because your heart, a muscle, is getting a workout. The stronger your heart muscle gets, the greater its ability to pump blood through the arteries, which also helps to reduce your blood pressure.

Exercising is an excellent way to reduce stress: Several studies indicate that exercise dissipates hormones and other chemicals that build up during periods of stress. Exercise also generates a period of substantial emotional and physical relaxation that sets in about an hour and a half after a relatively intense bout of physical activity.

Improves breathing: Aging affects the tissues of the lung in some ways that can’t be changed by exercise. However, exercise can improve your breathing by strengthening the muscles that help your lungs open up to bring in oxygen and compress to push out carbon dioxide. Exercise also improves the efficiency with which oxygen permeates the cells of your body through its effects on aerobic

If you have any questions, please leave a comment below and I will get back to you as soon as I can. I would love to have your feedback too, let me know what you think about the post.

Thank you very taking the time to share with us all the reasons as to why we should exercise.
I used to neglect exercise but I have created the habit of exercising on a daily basis and I feel so much better 🙂

There is a lot to like here. The part about improved cognitive function and sleep quality especially speak tome as those were improvements I was not necessarily expecting when I really dug into improving my fitness. I’m very grateful that I’ve made it a key part of my lifestyle and encourage you to keep up this empowering information you’re sharing!